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Home | Learn Chess | Chess Shoppe | Links | Glossary
The Opening Lure:
Can Studying Chess Openings Fast Track
Your Quest for Chess Success?
by Joe Iannandrea
"Chess is a game of understanding, not memory"
Eugene Znosko-Borovsky
The Opening Lure
I have a friend with whom I've been playing the occasional social game of chess lately. He is more or less where I was several years back; he played chess quite a bit when he was younger but had only played the occasional game in the intervening years leading to middle age. He's certainly a bright enough fellow, his knowledge of the rules is intact and he even has the occasional trick up his sleeve, but alas he's yet to win a game. This is understandable enough given our relative experience, but lately each session has ended with a familiar reprise “Watch out, I'm going to study some chess openings this weekend so next time you might not be so lucky.” Though I've tried suggest he'd get further studying other aspects of the game it seems nothing will shake his belief that studying chess openings specifically will give him the best chance to win.
My friend is by no means alone. Studying chess openings holds enormous appeal for chess players in general and beginners in particular. The sheer number of titles about the chess opening compared with other phases of the game stands as testament to this. For beginners it seems like there's a certain logic to studying openings rather than some other phase or aspect of the game. It's the beginning of the game after all, and that would seem (with apologies to Julie Andrews) a very good place to start. But this logic alone does not account for the lure that learning openings seems to have with newer chess players. To newer players the deeper understanding more advanced players possess may seem almost like arcane knowledge. Studying openings to present a much simpler option; no need to acquire a deep understanding like this, just learn the moves.
Many novices are so firmly set on the idea that a focus on learning openings is the best way to improve that they feel they can safely ignore the advice the advice they hear everywhere from the more experienced members of their local club to books written by the greatest minds in chess that openings are one of the last areas of the game that they should try to understand in depth. No matter how many times this is heard from people who really ought to know such things there is still seems to be the sense that this must be wrong. And even if the experts may be right with respect to gaining playing strength over the long term, surely learning some opening tricks promises an easy quick payoff. You can always learn the rest of that stuff later. So what is it with all these experts who say it's better to learn chess principles, tactics, even endgames? Has it been so long since they were beginners that they're out of touch? Is it simply chess dogma they feel compelled to repeat? Or could it be there really something to what they're all saying?
The Trap Trap
For many players, especially younger ones, careful considerations about what to study are quickly forgotten when faced with the possibility of achieving quick easy victory over unsuspecting opponents. Exposure to such a tantalizing prospect usually isn't long in coming when beginners are introduced to the Scholar's Mate. The Scholar's Mate can be used to defeat an unwary opponent in as little as four moves as demonstrated by the following sequence: 1. e4 e5 2. Qh5 (Novice players are frequently cautioned against bringing their Queen out too early where it can become a target. The hope that the present sequence might be played out is a major reason this advice is so often ignored.) 2...Nc6 (reasonable enough since 2... Nf6, though it attacks the Queen, allows 3. Qxe5+.) 3. Bc4 (Now both Queen and Bishop attack the f7 square, which is the point.) 3...Nf6?? (White has played the entire opening hoping Black would make this mistake, attacking the vulnerable Queen but ignoring...) 4. Qxf7#. Black's moves have all looked reasonable, especially for a beginner, and yet they have gone down to humiliating defeat after only four moves.
Having been exposed to this, either by a coach, in a book or article or perhaps finding themselves on the losing end of the Scholar's Mate, two thoughts usually occur to a player. 1- I must never (again) be humiliated by allowing this to be played against me, and 2- Wouldn't it be great if I could use this whip all my opponents! Few pause to consider that the second thought has big hole in it, namely the first thought. Nobody is going to allow themselves to get caught in this trap more than once or twice before they get wise to the trap, and many are shown how to avoid it first (as you will be shortly if you have never seen it before), and so don't ever get fooled by this even once. Let's face it, losing in four moves sucks. Players are strongly motivated not to be embarrassed this way. Though few players would allow themselves to lose this way more than once in their lives it rarely occurs to someone taken with the notion of winning a lot of easy victories this way exactly how this fact affects their chances. It is often only the experience repeated frustration in their hope for the occasional opponent who has never seen the Scholar's Mate that convinces some to move on to better ideas.
In truth the reason the Scholar's Mate appears in so many beginner's chess books is not because it's a good idea to use against your opponent but because it's so easy to defuse and even turn against anyone thinks to try it. To get a sense of why the hopeful move 2. Qh5 might not be so great after all, consider the simple way new players learn to easily turn this kind of attack aside. Instead of the fatal 3... Nf6, Black need simply play 3...g6 and White not only finds their ambitions completely thwarted, but quickly find themselves in trouble. This move only chases the offending Queen away but is a useful move in itself, opening the the g7 square which is a powerful post for Black's dark square Bishop. White now has to be careful as even after the Queen is taken out of immediate danger she may still be subject to attack. Choosing the wrong retreat square can be disastrous. For example, after 4.Qh3 Black could play 4...d5! attacking both the Queen (via the Bishop on c8) and the Bishop on c4, and White must give up the Bishop in order to again move the Queen to safety. A better move such as 4.Qf3 seems to continue the threat of mate, but after the normal developing move 4...Nf6 which is now safe the fundamentals of Black's position are strong while White still has the awkwardly placed Queen to contend with.
The Scholar's Mate is a well known trap because it can result from a fairly natural looking sequence of moves by the opponent. Being so well known however, it is difficult to find anyone who doesn't know about it and how to avoid it. There are of course less well known opening traps which some might still pin their hopes on. The problem with the more obscure traps is that they're obscure for a reason. They may, for example, require a particular series of opening moves from your opponent before they can be played, which won't happen in the vast majority of your games. They may also, as we saw with the Scholar's Mate, be a sort of double-edged sword, leaving you in a worse spot if the opponent doesn't fall for it. In the end, those who look to opening tricks as an elixir promising quick and easy success in chess quickly find themselves frustrated by their opponent's repeated refusal to play into their schemes.
The Rote Route
Even with the initial infatuation with opening tricks and traps out of the way however, many are still drawn by the idea that they can become stronger players faster by learning opening moves really well. It seems reasonable that the ability to play moves that were worked out in advance by a grandmaster from memory would give us a huge advantage over an opponent who had struggle to work out each move for themselves using only their beginner level chess skills. Surely learning specific moves is the easier way to go than hoping to understand all the ideas and principles they are based on. The great names in chess, they may have learned by now, devote a great deal of time to the study and analysis of openings, so it obviously works for them. So again, why is it that these same grandmasters are insisting it's better for beginners to study other things?
The idea most novices have of improving simply by leaning the same opening moves grandmasters make is based on a particular vision of what that learning will involve. Let's imagine someone deciding to master openings by learning the venerable Ruy Lopez, or Spanish Game, and making it“their” opening. There's certainly nothing wrong with that, it's an opening that's been used for centuries by players of all levels. The best players in the world continue to score victories with the Ruy Lopez today. You've got to play some opening moves, so why not the Ruy Lopez.
Many imagine that learning an opening involves learning the first eleven or twelve moves of the game. The Ruy Lopez opens with the moves 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5... simple enough, three down and only eight or nine more moves to go, right? Well, consider the player with Black can now play 3... a6, 3...a5, 3...g6, 3...g5, 3...d6, 3...d5, 3...b6, 3...f5, 3...Nd4, 3...f6, 3...Nge7, 3...Bc5, 3...Bb4, 3...Be7, 3...e7, or 3...Qe7. Some of these responses are more likely than others but all of them have been played by experienced players. Remember though, when facing novice opponents there's a good chance they'll make a move that you won't find in any opening reference material. These moves may not be as good, and there may be plenty of ways to take advantage of these poorer moves, but if all you have done is memorize moves you won't have learned anything that will tell you how. As far as our efforts to learn the Ruy Lopez are going however, we're not yet to move 4 and already we're in trouble. With each new move the possibilities expand exponentially.
Let's say this isn't enough to deter the intrepid novice. Other people are able to become experts with openings so why shouldn't they? What if it did mean memorizing a stupendous volume of material, wouldn't it be worth it in the end if you could be confident of emerging from the opening of any game on equal or better footing against even the strongest players? Imagine for argument's sake that it's possible, through monumental effort, for a beginner to learn an opening like the Ruy Lopez as thoroughly as a much more advanced player (I contend that it is not, as we'll see in a bit). It is still only possible to use all that knowledge if the opponent responds with 1...e5 and 2...Nc6. The opponent may, however, also play 1...c5, known generally as the Sicilian Defence that can continue with major recognized variations such as the Najdorf, Scheveningen, Dragon , Accelerated Dragon, Hyper-Accelerated Dragon, Classical, Sveshnikov, Alapin, Kalashnikov and Taimanov to name a few. The opponent also might begin 1... e6- the French Defence with it's associated list of variations, 1...c6- the Caro-Kann (ditto on the variations from here on), 1...d5 the Centre-Counter or Scandinavian Defence, 1...d6 the Pirc Defence, 1...Nf6 Alekhine's Defence, 1...g6 the Modern Defence or 1...Nc6 the Nimzovich Defence. Likewise even after the hoped for 1...e5 Black has many alternatives to 2. Nc6 which allowing them to sidestep the Ruy Lopez entirely, making all your hard won knowledge useless. Your only hope to avoid this possibility is to repeat the monumental effort that went into learning your one opening for every one of these other possibilities your opponent might steer the game towards. Then, in case it has escaped your notice, you'll also have to prepare for the half of your games you'll play as Black.
Of course you might well now ask how, if learning openings is all that hard, does anyone ever learn them? Many players, some of them world champions, are noted for their strength in the opening phases of the game. If their efforts paid off so spectacularly, shouldn't anyone benefit from studying the same things? It's a fair question, so let's spend some time looking at the difference between how a strong player learns opening theory compared with how a relative newcomer to the game imagines they will learn openings.
When a beginner first considers learning about openings they picture learning the moves to play through the first part of the game in advance, in other words through rote memorization. The problem with this, as shown above, is that the fact that the opponent has several different possible replies to each move, resulting in an exponential growth of possibilities as we get further into the game. The sheer number of alternative paths the game might lead down quickly overwhelms the most determined effort to memorize all the possibilities after only a few moves. The difference when an experienced player wants to learn the same opening is that they don't have to learn them by rote.
To understand why this is, it helps to understand some of the things we know know about how the brain learns. It's far easier to remember something new if we can put it in the context of what we already know. One of the most famous demonstrations of this idea comes, by good fortune, from the world of chess. In an episode of the documentary series “My Brilliant Brain”1 chess great Susan Polgar was profiled. To illustrate how powerfully the ability to learn something new is influenced by the ability to relate the new material to an existing base of knowledge the documentary features a demonstration in which Polgar is seated at an outdoor cafe as a white cube van drives past with a chess board position illustrated on the side. On it's first pass the illustration shows a position that “makes sense”, which is to say it is a position in which the pieces had the sort of dynamic relationships to each other that would arise in a real chess game between two reasonable players. To someone with Polgar's experience this gave the position certain easily identified features that allowed her to easily reproduce the exact position on a chess board once the van had passed even though she could only see it for a few seconds. When the van passed a second time the position had changed. Now pieces were placed randomly around the board with no particular relationship to the other pieces. This time her efforts to reproduce the position were completely hopeless, no better than the average non-chess player could do in the same circumstance.
What this demonstration shows us is that Polgar's ability to memorize the first position was not the result of some special gift she possesses for memorization. If it were she should have been able to reproduce the second position just as easily. Instead, her ability to remember the position that “made sense” stems from the fact that it is much easier to remember the sense it made than the position of each individual piece. Of course it was only Polgar's great familiarity with the game developed since childhood that allowed her to see the sense in the position so quickly. An equally intelligent non chess player would have had as much difficulty remembering this position as they would the random position.
To get a better sense of how this relates to your own ability to remember what you have learned, consider these two strings of nine words.
“Alice went to the theatre with her friend Bob.”
“Make to John bake some Mary seat with for.”
If I asked you half an hour from now to recite them both from memory, which would you have an easier time remembering? After reading the first sentence you might already have spontaneously formed a picture in your head of two friends going to the theatre, so remembering this later on may be no more difficult than remembering that their names are Alice and Bob. The second string of words, which doesn't really qualify as a “sentence”, offers no mental pictures, no relationships, no real sense at all for you to grab hold of. In the end all you can really do is memorize each word and the order they go in by rote, which will require much much more time.
It shouldn't be too difficult to see how this applies to the learning of chess openings. Experienced players have an overwhelming advantage when it comes to this phase of the game because they don't need to learn the moves by rote. As I hope I have conveyed earlier, doing so would be virtually impossible for anyone.
When specific openings are studied effectively by someone with a reasonable level of chess experience each move learned is important not because it was recommended by some grandmaster who checked it out with a computer, but because it serves a purpose in relationship to the ideas behind that opening. In other words it makes sense in relationship to what they already know which, as we have seen, makes it much easier to remember. Learning from a position of understanding also allows for much more flexibility. For example, even if you remember the moves what do you do when the opponent makes a move that you didn't expect? Do you just make the next move you learned and hope it's still okay? If you've done nothing more than learn the moves of your opening this is maybe all you can hope for, but a player that understands the purpose of the moves they've learned still has clear guidance which perhaps will allow them to take advantage if the unanticipated move is a mistake (which if it wasn't anticipated in opening theory there's a good chance it was.)
Of course, just as they couldn't memorize a sensible chess position in a few seconds like Susan Polgar, the beginner can't really hope to learn chess openings this way. Understanding chess openings on this level requires the ability to understand chess ideas in general. The more you understand about how to maximize the potential of each of your pieces, what factors make one position stronger than another, how to avoid tactical blunders (and take advantage of your opponent's) and how to conduct the game once you're out of the opening phase, the more you'll be able to collapse the impossible task of learning openings down to manageable size. In fact if your goal is simply to learn openings effectively, studying these other aspects of chess before studying openings in depth is the fastest and arguably only way to do so. This of course, will benefit every aspect of your game, not just openings.
Return to Reason
Hopefully you're starting to get a gut level sense for why all the experts steer novice level players away from attempting to learn openings in depth. Does this mean beginners should avoid learning anything about openings? The answer, you may be relieved to know, is it certainly does not mean that. After all, it would be difficult for any player to gain much experience if they keep getting beat up in the first stage of the game. What newer players should be learning about openings is very different than the kind of opening study more advanced players engage in however. For example, what a beginner learns about openings should be coupled with an explanation of the general chess principles they are based on.
One thing introductory level opening instructors stress is the importance of fighting for control of the centre of the board during the opening. Controlling the centre isn't just an opening principle, it's important throughout the game. If conceded during the opening however it will at the very least put a player at a disadvantage for the rest of the game. Learning this idea therefore makes it easy for a newer player to understand why some moves (for example 1.d4) are better than others (like 1.Nh3) during the opening. This kind of knowledge is the first step towards seeing the sense in openings thereby making them easier to learn. It also forms a guiding principle to use when the opponent's moves take them out of any opening they're familiar with. Since beginners usually face opponents with similar experience who aren't likely to follow the moves found in any opening reference an understanding of principles, rather than specific moves, becomes especially important.
Without going into great depth then, here's an overview of what someone newer to chess should learn about openings.
The basic ideas of opening play such as effective development of the pieces, King safety and the aforementioned control of the centre. Good examples of how different openings played by knowledgeable players seek to achieve these goals is very useful here. An important point to remember here is that the only absolute principle of good chess play is “If you can checkmate your opponent, do it.” All others are relative. Don't be confused then when you see openings that seem to violate an opening principle. In such cases there's a choice between following either of two principles and the recommended move is the greater of two goods (aka “the lesser of two evils”, but I'm a glass-half-full kind of guy.)
How to avoid aggressive trap openings other novice players are often so fond of. We have already seen the best known example of this when we looked at 2.Qh5 played in hopes of catching unwary opponents in the Scholar's Mate. More than just avoiding the disappointment of the few losses this might result in, learning to turn such misguided efforts aside will benefit your opponents by encouraging them to abandon silly tricks and learn to play real chess.
The first few moves of (4, maybe 5) of a well established solid opening as White, as well as a reply to both 1.e4 and 1.d4 to a similar depth when playing as Black. This is not so much intended for immediate practical benefit as you won't have the chance to play these exact moves in many of your games. The point is more to give you a basis for future learning.
Another benefit of this last point is that it avoids many of the bad openings many new players come up with when left to their own devices. For example, upon hearing that it's important to develop their pieces as early as possible, but that the Queen shouldn't be brought out too early, many players decide it's best to try to develop their next most powerful pieces, the Rooks, right away. This has lead many a beginner to reinvent the opening that may go something like. 1.a4 e5 2.Ra3 Bxa3 3.Nxa3... by which White not only loses the Rook for the less valuable Bishop (known in chess as losing “the exchange”) but they are left with a completely discombobulated position on just the third move of the game.
While books that explore a specific opening in depth are best left to players intermediate level or higher for reasons discussed, there are other references more suited to learning what a player needs to know about openings at an introductory level. A good general introduction to chess such as Chess for Dummies usually includes enough to get you started with openings. Once you are a little more advanced there are a few books about openings that explore these same ideas in much more depth without going too far into the specifics of a particular opening. Two good examples of books of this type are Yasser Seirawan's Winning Chess Openings and The Complete Idiot's Guide to Chess Openings by William Aramil. While books of this type may tend to slant towards the author's favourite openings with the examples they show, the ideas they present are relevant to any opening you may choose to play. I would not recommend jumping to one of these as your second chess book, but certainly once you've become established as a chess player and have a good many games under your belt they can be a great benefit.
Finally, with all the talk about learning openings from chess books, it's easy to miss the fact that much of the opening skills you develop will come about not as the result of direct study but experience gained through playing and figuring out where you went wrong (which you will.) As I hope will become clear to you as you start to gain experience one of the best tools available to you for chess improvement is a record of your own games in standard chess notation. Deriving the most benefit from your experience with openings, as with the rest of your games, involves reviewing the games you have played afterwards. A good opening reference book such as Nunn's Chess Openings (NCO) is often recommended for this purpose. This is a different sort of opening book, more an encyclopedia of all chess openings you can use to to see where you went wrong. Alternatively you can use analysis software such as Fritz to find out where you might have gone wrong in the opening as well as at any other point in the game.
Early in their chess career many, perhaps most chess players entertain the notion that opening study offers an easy way to sidestep the need for a deeper understanding of chess. We have seen that it is really this deeper understanding of chess that makes it possible to really benefit from this kind of opening study. It's easy to understand the desire for a quick painless path to success; it can be seen in nearly any area of human endeavour. Whatever we might desire however, reason tells us that if there were a quick painless way to become good at chess somebody would have figured it out long ago. Some ways are better than others to be sure, but even the greats like Fischer and Kasparov had to expend enormous effort to become as good as they did. There are games that are easy to learn out there. They may be fun to play but they're not chess. In the end chess is so worthwhile precisely because it is challenging and continues to be no matter how good at it we get. Rather than hoping for a way to skirt around it, consider the challenge as something to be embraced for it's own sake. It's what chess is about. Who would want it any other way?
References
1. My Brilliant Brain. Dir. Ian Duncan & Kenny Scott. Windfall Films, 2007.
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